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Battenfeld Gloucester Engineering Co. Ltd. said its air knife/soft box attachment, for cast polyprolylene lines, makes it easier to pin webs of different thickness to the chill roll immediately after it exits the die.

Each component is suited for a different film thickness, so a cast PP line uses one or the other separately. Now Battenfeld Gloucester brings them together by mounting the knife on top of the soft box. It can handle film thickness from 20-150 microns.

The component is attached in the same general area of the machine as conventional devices, between the die and chill roll. To change products and get the right air flow to pin the web to the chill roll, you make a mechanical adjustment and index the correct side into place. Because the system doesn't have to be removed, processors eliminate downtime required to disconnect one device and install the other one.

The device is available on new equipment or as a retrofit.

The company in Gloucester, Mass., said it installed the first air knife/soft box component on a production line installed in China in late 2003.

Epco is adding one of its E-6500 programmable controllers for blow molding. It has expandable capabilities, including the ability to control up to four parisons. Epco also had complete responsibility for electrical engineering on this project.

Epco President Steve Schroeder said the typical turnaround for this type of remanufacturing job is 12 weeks.

SIG Kautex, a unit of SIG Plastics International GmbH, makes large accumulator-head machines in Bonn, Germany, including specialized multilayer machines for automotive gas tanks. In 2002, the company closed its U.S. assembly operation at SIG Plastics Technologies (USA) Inc. in North Branch, N.J.

Visteon Corp. had used the KB-250 to blow mold gas tanks. Wolfgang Meyer, president of the SIG Kautex business unit, said SIG purchased the blow molding machine back from Visteon Corp. After the remanufacturing is completed, the machine will go to a custom molder, he said.

Epco has worked on blow molding machines before, but this is the first time the company has completely remanufactured one up to the level of a new machine, Schroeder said.

Epco has experience building big plastics machines, including large-tonnage injection presses for Husky Injection Molding Systems Ltd. Epco currently is building large thermoforming machines for its sister company, Brown Machine LLC.

Thermoforming equipment maker Brown Machine LLC has received a patent for its tool design that uses an external plug-assist plate.

Thermoforming tools with the plate reduce the air consumption of third-platen thermoforming equipment more than do traditional, internal plug-assist tools.

For example, for round products, a pressure box with an internal plug-assist plate will use twice the blow-form air that would be consumed by the same pressure box with an external plug-assist plate, according to Brown tooling engineering manager Bill Wells.

For rectangular products with small corner radii, the difference is less than twice, but still significant, Wells said.

Colormax Ltd. of Telford, England, is offering two screwless feeding mechanisms to dose free-flowing masterbatch or additives into the process screw - the Micro Feeder (B110) and the Posimax (B200).

The Micro Feeder uses a simple, induced-flow rotating cone, so it can dole out from just a few granules up to 6.6 pounds of material an hour. The controller allows easy calibration of the desired additive ratio, which is linked to the injection screw back-time or the extruder speed tachometer.

The Posimax uses positive displacement feeding. It has only one moving part, a rotating vertical disc for feeding the material via a rotating channel.

Pittsburgh-based Conair Group said the position-based servo-drive system, now standard on its new fly knife cutters, increases the cut-to-length accuracy by as much as 1,000 percent, at a price nearly 20 percent lower than similar cutters.

The CKS series cutters are available in 2-, 3-, 4- and 5-inch diameter cutting capacities. The machine can make up to 350 cuts per minute in on-demand mode, or up to 4,500 cuts per minute in flywheel mode.

The control panel features a multitasking motion coordinator instead of a more conventional preset counter. The motion coordinator measures length instead of depending on readings that come from a separate counter-virtually eliminating the time required for the program loop to monitor incoming information on length, check against the programmed length, and signal the cut.

* Eurotherm of Leesburg, Va., has released a remote-notification feature for its 5000 Series Data Management System. It sends an alarm or status information to a cell phone via text messaging, or through an e-mail. ... Ion Industrial of Windsor Locks, Conn., uses a fiber-reinforced-plastic body for its 80 01KD-W bar, which removes static electricity during the manufacturing process. ... Under a new risk-free program, molders can try Gammaflux LP's hot-runner control systems for two weeks. After the trial period, customers can decide to keep the controller or return it to the company in Sterling, Va. ... Jorgenson Machinery Corp., a Houston-based systems integrator specializing in surface inspection and cleaning, specialty extrusion systems, polymer testing equipment and laboratory extruders, announced agreements to sell three product lines: SolveTech Inc. film thickness gauging equipment, CRG Logistics blenders and Dynisco Inc.'s polymer testing equipment.

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